WAVEWATCH III® Hindcast and Reanalysis Archives

MMAB currently maintains two classes of WAVEWATCH III®
hindcasts.

A thirty-year hindcast generated from the
NCEP Climate Forecast System Reanalysis and Reforecast (CFSRR)
homogeneous dataset of hourly high-resolution winds. The time
period covers from 1979 through 2009. This is a true hindcast
generated with a single version of the model and a statistically
consistent forcing wind field, and is suitable for use in climate
studies.

An ongoing data set produced by rerunning the model from the
operational wind fields to produce best-estimate nowcast datasets.
This is a statistically inhomogeneous hindcast data set, because the
underlying models are periodically updated. Therefore this data set
should not be used for climate studies.

Both are described in detail below, with links to the datasets,
validation statistics from buoy match-ups, and visualizations of the
model data fields.

These hindcasts have been developed in stages, as part of a NOPP
project to improve the physics packages of wind-wave models. In
atmospheric modeling, a statistically homogeneous dataset can be
generated by performing a reanalysis with consistent model setup
and using all available data for the entire period. There is
not enough data to develop a similar reanalysis for wind waves.
However, wave dynamics are different from atmospheric dynamics,
in the sense that they represent a forced/damped problem rather
than an initial value problem, and wind forcing is the dominant
process driving wave dynamics. Therefore it's possible to
produce an accurate hindcast without assimilating wave data, but
using a wind field from a long-term reanalysis such as the
Climate Forecast System Reanalysis (CFSR, Saha et al 2010). This
is a couple reanalysis of atmospheric, oceanic, sea-ice, and
land data, at much higher resolution than previous reanalysis.

Used the WAVEWATCH III model (v5.08), with the Ardhuin et al (2010)
source term package.

Used bias corrected CFSR winds.

Used an Arctic curvilinear grid.

The production hindcast uses the operational multi-grid spectral wave
model WAVEWATCH III® with operational NCEP winds and ice fields as
input forcing fields. No wave data assimilation is performed.
The model is run after the end of each month, with all available data.